


Classrooms, Part 2

by pallasite



Series: Behind the Gloves [80]
Category: Babylon 5, Babylon 5 & Related Fandoms
Genre: Backstory, Canon Compliant, Children, Essays, Fix-It, Gen, Growing up in the cadre system, Psi Cops, Psi Corps, School, Worldbuilding, telepaths
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-11
Updated: 2017-11-11
Packaged: 2019-01-31 19:35:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,147
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12688833
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pallasite/pseuds/pallasite
Summary: A continuation ofthis essayon the differences between telepath classrooms and normal classrooms. Because I did think of more to say, after all!The prologue ofBehind the Glovesishere- please read!





	Classrooms, Part 2

**Author's Note:**

> What is this series? Where are the acknowledgements, table of contents and universe timelines? See [here](http://archiveofourown.org/works/10184558/chapters/22620590).
> 
> If you like _Behind the Gloves_ and would like to send me an email, I can be reached at counterintuitive at protonmail dot com. Do you have questions? Would you like to tell me what you like about this project? Email me!
> 
> I also have an [ask blog](https://behind-the-gloves.tumblr.com/), a [writing blog](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/pallasite-writes), and a "P3 life" Tumblr [here](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/p3-life) with funny anecdotes. :)

Indeed, I thought of more to, so I offer this essay as an extension of the last one.

  * **Telepath children do not have "vacations" (or "holiday," as it's called in the UK) in the same way that normal students do.**



         There is time set aside for recreation - for sports, for "constructive play," for arts and music, for vids, etc., and older students are allowed to leave campus for short excursions, even overnight - but there are no prolonged "vacations". Students have class or other structured enrichment activities seven days a week, aside from select special days set aside for celebrations or other social occasions (the one mentioned in canon is, of course, Birthday, which is the most important). Older students in the more competitive tracks are expected to be self-motivated enough to spend as much time as it takes to produce work of the highest caliber, even if that means they have less time for social activities.

         There is no "summer vacation." This is a completely foreign concept.

  * **Telepath children all stay in school until they are nineteen (by telepath age-reckoning), which is roughly eighteen and a half.**



         Students graduate from the Major Academy at nineteen. If they are going to the Business Division, they attend a special short training program after that (a year, iirc). Similar programs exist for students working in other normal-facing jobs. Students going on to advanced studies in the Corps (for professional Corps jobs, such as doctors or nurses) go on to this training after graduation from the Major Academy. Psi Cops begin their internships in the field. Students who are heading for less-skilled Corps jobs go right to work.

         In contrast, in the normal world, the age of enlistment in EarthForce begins at seventeen.

  * **Young children do minor chores, while older children (likely) do more.**



         Young children learn to keep their (shared) rooms tidy, put their books and toys and clothes in their proper place, make their beds, and do other small chores. Older children also do their own laundry, and depending on the school, may also help with the cleaning of campus. (The flagship school in Geneva has staff to do all of that, and the students can focus full-time on their studies.)

  * **Even after graduation, Psi Cops do not live in their own apartments for years.**



         Through their internships, young Psi Cops still live in dorms, with more than one person per room. Even after graduating from their internships, Psi Cops still live in dorms (with more than one person per room) until they make Lieutenant, which takes at the minimum four years. (Bester got promoted in four years, and that was unusual - remarkable, even.) So someone raised in the Corps who becomes a Psi Cop won't sleep in a (modest) apartment of his or her "own" until he or she is twenty-five or twenty-six. Some take longer. Some don't live to promotion.

  * Going back to the cadre system, **there are no "field trips" off campus.**



         Students in the cadre system do not leave campus. Only select students in the Minor Academy are allowed to leave campus, and even students in the Major Academy must apply for passes to leave campus, passes that must be approved by faculty (where you will go, how long you will be away, etc.). Students grow up _extremely_ sheltered about the outside world. They are exposed to a vast amount of material about the world through their books and vids (about food and history and travel, etc.), but have personally experienced almost none of it. (Yes, they can hear music from around the world, but no, they can't get to try foods from all around the world. Yes, they can watch vids about travel, but no, they can't yet go to any of these places. Outside the campus gates might as well be Mars.) This is the trade-off between trying to educate the students, while also keeping them safe - and frankly, alive. (Telepath kids are highly "prized" by traffickers.) It's not a perfect system, though, because it leaves kids dangerously naive when they do enter the "real world." (GEE WHY SHOULD I DROP MY SHIELDS AND SEE IF ANYONE'S PLOTTING TO KILL ME WHEN I GO ALONE INTO DOWNBELOW? Wait... why am I going alone into Downbelow in the first place?!)

         Something as simple as "we got to go to the zoo today" would be a huge deal to children raised in the Corps, because we're talking about teenagers who have never seen these animals other than in vids. They're lucky to have seen dogs (if they were raised in the Corps from the beginning). Going on an airplane for the first time? A train? This is a very big deal. They don't learn how to drive groundcars until they're older, either (if they learn how to drive - not everyone lives in a place where this makes sense).

  *   **The Psi Corps school in Syria Planum, on Mars, uses a "buddy system" for newcomers.**



          The flagship Geneva school doesn't do this, so YMMV about other schools. On Mars (there's only one Corps school on Mars, called "the Center" according to Talia), new students (especially young ones, perhaps) are assigned an older "buddy" for a year. That older student helps the younger student adjust to life at school, and then gets reassigned to another newcomer the following year. (I assume the young student also lives in his/her cadre, while having an older "buddy" that he or she checks in with every day.)

  * **Titles can be confusing.**



         When kids are little, all the adults are Mr./Ms. These adults are both teachers and caregivers.

         When kids get older (still in the cadres), they still have caregivers (who also act as teachers), but they also have teachers who _only_ act as teachers, and those adults are known as Teacher [such and such]. They're more senior.

         Other support staff (nurse, etc.) are also known as Mr./Ms., like the caregivers.

         When kids graduate from the cadres, they have more teachers in their lives, and fewer caregivers. Teachers are still addressed as "Teacher [such and such]." They may meet school administrators, as well, who are Mr./Ms., because they are not (directly) teachers. There may also be teachers whom they don't address as "teacher" for one reason or another: Sandoval Bey, for instance, is an instructor, but his _primary job_ is as station chief of Geneva's MetaPol station. So he's "Mr. Bey."

         As a side point, Psi Cops never address each other with rank, always with Mr./Ms. They only address each other by rank in vids produced by the Corps for normals (because it sounds more formal and normals like that), and in vids produced by (ignorant) normals about the Corps.

         So yes, the chief of MetaPol and the nanny changing a kid's diaper are addressed with the same title. The director, however, is still "Director [such and such]."


End file.
